Hooper Strait Light

(moved to) The Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum, Saint Michaels, MD, cir. 1880
Navigational lights at Hooper Strait date back to 1827 when a light vessel station was established there. A first screwpile style lighthouse, built on sleeve-piles, was constructed in 1867. However, this structure lasted only ten years before being destroyed by ice flows. (The resident keepers made a harrowing escape by pulling a small boat across the ice to safety.) In January 1879 Congress appropriated money for a second lighthouse. The structure was designed and built in Baltimore, then dismantled and re-erected at the site in October of that year on stronger, solid iron, screw piles. It remained active until December 1952 when it was fully automated. Soon after being boarded up, the dwelling began to deteriorate and succumb to vandalism. It had been slated for destruction in 1966 when it was acquired by the Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum in St. Michaels, MD. The lighthouse was cut from its original pilings and transported up the Bay to its new site in November of that year. It is now beautifully restored and one of only four screwpile lighthouses left on the Bay.